Audio Book Review: Blood Red Road - Hopelessly Devoted Bibliophile

Media Type: Audio Book
Title: Blood Red Road
*Series: Dust Lands #1
Author: Moira Young
Narrator: Heather Lind
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
Format: Digital MP3
Duration: 10 hours 17 minutes
Source: Purchased on Audible
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Intended Reading Group: Young Adult
Content Screening: Violence, Mild Language
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HDB Rating: 5 Keys to My Heart

Add it on: Goodreads / Shelfari / Amazon / B&N

A girl goes on an epic journey through a bleak landscape in the first book of this post-Apocalyptic trilogy. Saba has spent her whole life in Silverlake, a dried-up wasteland ravaged by constant sandstorms. The Wrecker civilization has long been destroyed, leaving only landfills for Saba and her family to scavenge from.

That’s fine by her, as long as her beloved twin brother Lugh is around. But when a monster sandstorm arrives, along with four cloaked horsemen, Saba’s world is shattered. Lugh is captured, and Saba embarks on a quest to get him back. Suddenly thrown into the lawless, ugly reality of the world outside of desolate Silverlake, Saba is lost without Lugh to guide her. So perhaps the most surprising thing of all is what Saba learns about herself: she is a fierce fighter, an unbeatable survivor, and a cunning opponent. She has the power to take down a corrupt society from the inside.

Teamed up with a handsome daredevil named Jack and a gang of girl revolutionaries called the Free Hawks, Saba stages a showdown that will change the course of her own civilization. Blood Red Road has a searing pace, a poetically minimal style, violent action, and an epic love story.

Narrator Review:
Starting out, I wasn’t sure I liked Heather Lind’s different voices. However the more I listened, the more I got involved in the story, I started to realize that they were spot on! She has just enough difference in each character’s voice to make them easy to distinguish. Best of all, she makes Saba sound like I thought she would. Tough. I loved it.

The pacing is perfect. Her speech is rich and well pronounced. It’s honestly hard not to feel like the audio book of this is far superior to the print copy. I didn’t just read this book, I got to live it.

Audio Book Rating: 5/5 – A must listen!

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Book Review:

Blood Red Road was a book that greatly surprised me. I wasn’t expecting to fall in love but, without warning, I was sucked in to Saba’s world. All that hype that you saw when this book first came out? Completely and utterly spot on. I absolutely adored this story.

Saba is a tough character to love. She’s stubborn, fierce as all get out, and witty too. In other words, a recipe for my perfect female character. However her stubborn attitude more often than not causes her to make very rash decisions. I’ll fully admit that there were multiple times I wanted to reach in and just slap her for a moment. I understood why Moira Young created her this way though. Saba is used to having to take care of herself. She’s used to being a lone wolf.

That is, of course, until she meets Jack. Ah, Jack. Witty, lovable, and sometimes completely lost Jack. He was definitely my favorite character. The perfect opposite to everything that Saba was. Their relationship was rocky, it was real, it was amazing! All work and no play makes Saba a dull girl. Good thing Jack was around! Seriously though, every single character that travels alongside these two shines off the page. They are so well-crafted, that it is hard not to find yourself rooting for them as you read.

What else can I say to make you pick up this book? Refreshingly, Blood Red Road is unlike a lot of other dystopian novels out there. Instead of focusing solely on a society, with a bit of characterization thrown in, Young’s book is all about the characters. You’ll find yourself beside them as they fight to survive, tackle problems thrown in their path, and wrestle with the age old question of who they really are. It seems odd that this would work so well, but it honestly does. I was able to get so lost in Saba’s world, that I honestly didn’t want to come back out.

At the end of the day, if you are a reader of dystopian fiction this is a book that you’re going to need to pick up. The twists and turns in the plot will delight you. The fierce, dogged pace of the story will make you feel like you’re on the brink of exhaustion. Then you’ll meet the characters and realize that there is no turning back. Moira Young did a fabulous job with this book. I’m just going to come right out and say I want more. Soon.

FTC Disclosure: I received a copy of this book in exchange for a fair and honest review. I was not monetarily compensated for my opinion.

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